Dakota Tavern's "renovation" marks the end of an era for a beloved T.O. live music venue

Apparently, the Dakota Tavern won't be returning as a live music venue. Who really needs another sports bar in Toronto?  

Derek Downham remembers the Dakota Tavern

The death of The Dakota Tavern represents so much more than just the loss of a great live music venue.

This is where some of Toronto's greatest bands were born and nurtured.

This is where strangers met to dance and fall in love. 

This is where for many years there was a mutual respect between band, audience and staff.

That's what made it so very special.

My emotional connection to The Dakota cannot be overstated. 

I am honoured that I had the opportunity to be a part of it's heyday for 11+ years on Sundays with The Beauties and as part of so many other groups. I actually can't calculate how many shows I played there. Several hundreds, certainly.

Thank you to Jennifer Haslett, Maggie Ruhl & Shawn Thomas Creamer for giving myself and so many others the opportunity to play and build community at The Dakota.

While many of us have already moved on and mourned the loss years ago, I feel this needed to be said.

Thank you.

There will never be another scene like The Dakota on a Sunday when The Beauties played. The music, the abandon, the happiness...truly the greatest and longest running weekly gig I have ever seen or been a part of. It's where I met and played for my heroes like Stuart Copeland, Johnny Marr...Jason Momoa would pick me up like a rag doll. The nights with Kevin Drew and the Metric crew were nothing short of legendary. The Beauties got to play the Junofest Gala, signed to Six Shooter Records and played Zach Galafanakis' wedding because of these nights. This is all just the tip of the iceberg of what came out of these incredible shows. 

Thank you to every one of you who came out and supported us and the venue.

I've lived a truly blessed musical life, and a huge part of that is because of The Dakota Tavern.

So Long, Dakota

There is no way

To draw the end of a line

There is no way to tell ending of time - it’s over 

And in a way we are a victim of crime

Another way to paint a picture so fine, moreover

So Long Dakota, Carry On Dakota

We had a day 

we had a decade or more

There wasn’t anybody keeping the score

It’s over 

We saw the morning through a bottle of wine

We held each other 

‘Til the end of the night spilled over

So Long Dakota, Carry On Dakota

- DD

Now, more than ever: 

THANK YOU FOR SUPPORTING LIVE MUSIC. 

Without you, it ceases to exist. 

For more info on the unfolding story about The Dakota Tavern, check out Lindsay Dunn's report for City News (below) and the Exclaim piece in the links section. Also, watch The Beauties performing "Fashion Blues" at The Dakota Tavern back in 2010 below followed by a performance by Colonel Tom Parker & The American Pour feat. Nichol Robertson on guitar and a 360' clip of Toronto's premiere blues duo Catl in action.

LINKS

Exclaim.ca Toronto's Dakota Tavern reportedly not reopening

Kevin Drew releasing new instrumental album as KDAP

Broken Social Scene mainman Kevin Drew is releasing his new instrumental album Influences via Arts & Crafts on July 16.

Here's the scoop...

KDAP (an acronym for Kevin Drew a Picture) is Kevin Drew. You may know him as the leader of Toronto indie-rock ensemble Broken Social Scene—but let’s imagine that he wasn’t. Instead, let’s imagine that the young man who spent his early 20s obsessing over Brian Eno’s ambient works, Morricone soundtracks, Chicago post-rock, and the early Warp Records catalogue never left the basement, never met his future BSS partner Brendan Canning in 1999, never discovered a wider community of musicians, and never worked up the nerve to sing about love and spit on stage in front of thousands of people. Now take that kid, time-warp him to 2021, hand him a smartphone with a DIY beat-making app, and drop him in a forest somewhere in the south of England. The result would sound something like Influences.

KDAP - Influences

Yes, like many records you’ll hear this year, Influences was a product of the pandemic. But it doesn’t so much capture the sound of lockdown as it does liberation, music unbound from the laws of traditional song structure and the crowd-pleasing pressures of fronting a popular rock band. The truth is, Kevin had been itching to make a record like this well before the world stopped turning in March 2020. After his two decades of playing with Broken Social Scene left him with a chronic back injury and a dearth of fresh songwriting inspiration, he longed for both a physical and aesthetic retreat, and to reconnect with the therapeutic powers of instrumental music that he first experienced as a teenager. The pandemic simply provided him with the time and space to finally make it happen, as he spent the summer of 2020 riding out COVID’s first wave in the London area.

But while the aptly-named Influences marks a return to the early inspirations that first prompted Kevin to make music some 25 years ago, it expresses those old impulses through an entirely new language, and exercises them in a completely different environment. This isn’t a basement record; it’s an outdoor record, written in real time during long walks through the woods of Slinford and along the canals of Islington on the smartphone production software Endlesss. For Kevin, this app wasn’t some mere time-killing toy, but a tool that completely transformed his approach to making music, its simple interface presenting him with infinite new possibilities and reigniting a childlike, what-does-this-button-do sense of experimentation. Instead of jamming with musicians, he was now interacting with his natural environment, intuitively switching up his beats and arrangements in response to changes in environmental stimuli, be it the discovery of a new vista or a cyclist whipping by and nearly killing him. The easy-flowing, artistically freeing nature of the music’s creation is reflected in the alias Kevin eventually adopted for the project—KDAP, a.k.a., Kevin Drew a Picture—and by the time he returned to Toronto following his UK retreat, he had accumulated nearly 45 song sketches.

Influences is positively pulsating with life, a kaleidoscopic constellation of strobe-lit electronics, rippling rhythms, and gleaming digital melodies that tap into a very 2021 feeling of existence.

Pre-order Influences right here. Check out "The Slinfold Loop" followed by the track list for Influences below.

KDAP - INFLUENCES 

The Slinfold Loop

Hopefully Something

Dooms Dive

Shadow Rescues

You and Me and Them

Wilner’s Parade

Explosive Lip Balm

Almost Victory (Keep End Going)

Andy Kim's Christmas Show @ Queen Elizabeth Theatre, Wednesday

Andy Kim will be joined by Broken Social Scene, Ron Sexsmith & Alex Lifeson on Wednesday which is also Andy's 72nd birthday.

Gord Downie video released ahead of Introduce Yerself album

Gord Downie's 23-song album Introduce Yerself – produced & co-written by Kevin Drew – is out Friday on Arts & Crafts.

In the lead-up to the release of Gord Downie's new album, Introduce Yerself, tomorrow, Arts & Crafts has shared a video documenting the creation of the album's closing song, "The North." Directed by Jennifer Baichwal and Nicolas de Pencier, the clip is an intimate look at the creation of Downie's final work coming together in the studio with producer Kevin Drew, Dave Hamelin and engineer Nyles Spencer at The Bathouse studio in Bath, Ontario.

Co-written and produced by Broken Social Scene's Kevin Drew, the album's twenty-three songs were recorded swiftly over two four-day sessions in January 2016 and February 2017, with the finished album often reflecting first takes.

"A lot of these I wrote the words in advance," Downie said at the time of recording. "Like poems. I'd get one or two a day and then I'd have to stop. Because that's about all... the soul or whatever, would give up. And then, so with music, it becomes pretty easy."

Introduce Yerself will be released on CD and digital formats on October 27. The vinyl version follows on December 15, housed in a double gatefold jacket with two pull-out posters. See the complete tracklist following the clip below.



Gord Downie - Introduce Yerself 
1. First Person
2. Wolf's Home
3. Bedtime
4. Introduce Yerself
5. Coco Chanel No. 5
6. Ricky Please
7. Safe Is Dead
8. Spoon
9. A Natural
10. Faith Faith
11. My First Girlfriend
12. Yer Ashore
13. Love Over Money
14. You Me And The B's
15. Snowflake
16. A Better End
17. Nancy
18. Thinking About Us
19. The Road
20. You Are The Bird
21. The Lake
22. Far Away And Blurred
23. The North

Andy Kim and Foreigner appear in Broken Social Scene's Skyline video

Andy Kim is apparently committed to both peanut butter and his friends in Broken Social Scene.

Feist documentary hits Toronto and DVD shelves

Whether due to public demand or the fact that Feist simply had a day off in Toronto between gigs, Anthony Seck's documentary Look At What The Light Did Now – a behind-the-scenes look at the making of The Reminder album and the aftermath – will finally get a public screening in Toronto at The Royal Ontario Museum on November 21 beginning at 8 pm. Check out the film trailer and Feist's charming rendition of the title song with Little Wings which I previously posted right here.
For some reason, the presentation will be hosted CBC poster boy George Stroumboulopoulos – evidently both Ron MacLean and Linden Macintyre were busy that night – who'll no doubt heap praise upon La Feist and director Seck for a full 15 minutes before giving way to some thoughtful questions from the audience for another 10 minutes and it'll be all over by 10:15 pm.

Those who aren't quick enough to score tickets to the ROM event should note that Look At What The Light Did Now will be issued as a DVD on December 7 and yes, there's extra material that won't be seen at the ROM. What exactly do you get? Well, there are five single shot, unedited live performances (Limit To Your Love, Secret Heart, Help Is On It's Way and So Sorry) from The Reminder tour; footage from The Living Lantern – a performance at the Cameron House; archival footage of Feist and record producer Chilly Gonzales on the Presidential Suite Tour 2002; two short films (The Water directed by Kevin Drew and Departures co-starring Kevin Drew), along with music videos for I Feel It All, 1234, My Moon My Man and Honey Honey. 
The 13-track bonus CD includes solo and duet versions of the title track of the film, rare and unique live performances, and just what everyone in Berlin was waiting to hear – solo piano reinterpretations of Feist's songs Intuition, The Water, Sea Lion Woman and 1234 by maestro Gonzales!
Unfortunately, the DVD doesn't feature any live footage of Feist fronting the Calgary grunge band Placebo from the early 90s prior to moving to Toronto or what has proven to be her most popular television appearance ever – Sesame Street. So for anyone who can't get enough Feist, I've included a couple of entertaining clips below. You're welcome. 


Double Run by Placebo (w/Feist)

 

Back Down The Same Way by Placebo (w/Feist)



Lazy Bermuda by Placebo (w/ Feist)



Feist on Sesame Street